On the fifth day of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, one of many unanswered questions is why Russia has launched a military campaign at huge cost with maximalist objectives, and then declined to use the vast majority of its fixed wing combat aircraft.
Having grown up in USSR, I can give you some insight into what people in Russia think. People deeply resent the west because they feel that the west chose to treat the Soviet Union as the enemy. It was promptly invaded in 1918 right after the revolution ended. Then it was plunged into WW2 a couple of decades later, and after that there was the Cold War. USSR has been under threat of war from the western world throughout its whole existence.
Then in the 90s when USSR collapsed everyone thought that we’d join the west and live as one big happy family since we chose to adopt the western model and there was nothing left to fight about. Instead of that Russia treated to economic shock and plundering by western powers. Life became absolutely horrific for the vast majority of people, and I personally remember things like food shortages during that time.
This was the point where people realized that the west never had any good intentions towards Russia. This is precisely what gave rise to Putin who managed to take control of the economy and make Russia a sovereign state again.
Nowadays there’s deep mistrust on both sides, and I really don’t know how that can be bridged after this war. It seems to me that relations between the west and Russia are rolling back to USSR days where both sides are treating each other as an enemy and an existential threat. I suspect that things will get a lot worse before they get better.